Pope John XXIII: A Life (Penguin Lives) - Softcover

Cahill, Thomas

Softcover

ISBN 10: 014311302X ISBN 13: 9780143113027

Publisher: Penguin Books, 2008

Synopsis

The author's trademark blend of profound insight and extensive knowledge provides a fascinating history of the Catholic Church and the papacy by focusing on Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli as Pope John XXIII, who awed the world with the seminal and unprecedented changes he brought about due to his concern for humankind. Reprint.

About this title

Review:

The punchy Penguin Lives series is the best thing to hit popular biography in some time, and Thomas Cahill is just the fun and erudite guy to Penguinize Pope John XXIII. He captures both the irresistible character of Angelo "Little Angel" Giuseppe Roncalli, a peasant born in backwards Bergamo, and his place in world and church history. In fact, Cahill shows, as John XXIII, Angelo brought the church into the modern world in the 1960s, upsetting the poisoned apple cart of his nefarious predecessor, Pius X, whom Cahill convincingly likens to a Joe McCarthy with the private meanness of Nixon. John XXIII anticipated liberation theology by seven decades, reached out to Protestants and even non-Christians, and saved thousands of Jews from Hitler by wily machinations Cahill aptly compares to Paul's epistle to Philemon. (Cahill says it's unfair to brand Angelo's immediate predecessor, Pius XII, as Hitler's Pope--though he was a "moral pygmy" next to the giant John XXIII.) Cahill gives a quickie history of the Papacy that generations of cramming history students will thank God for, and includes just enough about Pope John's irreverent wit and way of life--the La Grenouille chef, the Jackie Kennedy friendship, the possibly apocryphal quip to a buxom woman wearing a crucifix ("What a Golgotha!"). An exemplary brief bio of an exemplary man. --Tim Appelo

About the Author:

Thomas Cahill, former director of religious publishing at Doubleday, is the bestselling author of the Hinges of History series.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 014311302X
• ISBN 13: 9780143113027
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256